Abram rescues Lot

An escapee tells “Abram the Hebrew,” living by the terebinths of Mamre the Amorite, bound by treaty with Aner, Eshcol, and Mamre. Abram hears that “his brother” has been taken (BSB “his relative”), empties out his trained men, 318 born in his house, and pursues as far as Dan. By night he divides himself against them, he and his servants, and pursues to Hobah, “on the left of Damascus” (BSB “north of Damascus”), and brings back the goods, Lot, the women, and the people. The persons are real; Abram rescues Lot, who had chosen the plain (pointed to in Lot’s choice and Sodom and The separation of Abram and Lot, not taken up again). Driver locates Dan “In the far N. of Canaan, near the foot of Ḥermon”, and says that at the time “it would however be called Laish”: the later name is used for the reader. Skinner writes, “and it is singular that such a prolepsis should occur”, and finds “the undoubted anachronism involved in the use of the name Dan”. Keil holds that this Dan “cannot have been identical with Leshem or Laish”, being “no doubt the same as the Dan-Jaan mentioned in 2 Sam. xxiv. 6”. Whether “Dan” is instead a later gloss is not argued by the sources cited here. The Jerusalem Targum reads “Dan of Kisarion”; Jubilees has “they went to Dan”. No ruling is given. See The 318, the night attack and Dan and Abram the Hebrew rescues Lot, in early reading.